City College dismantles faculty leadership

S.F. City College

Updated 10:54 am, Friday, October 26, 2012

Over objections from dozens of department chairs at City College of San Francisco, the Board of Trustees voted unanimously early Friday to dismantle a decades-long system of faculty leadership at the nearly bankrupt school of 86,000 students.

The trustees did it to save $2 million, streamline governance, and because, they were told, the college would edge closer to losing accreditation if they didn't.

"Without dramatic change, there won't be a college," interim Chancellor Pamila Fisher scolded the trustees at 1:30 a.m. when she feared they might waver. "Time is of the essence. The accrediting commission made it clear as recently as yesterday that they are concerned we are not moving quickly enough."

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City College has until March 15 to prove it should to stay in business. The accrediting commission has said one major problem is the college's byzantine and costly governance structure - unparalleled among California community colleges.

More than 60 faculty members earn extra pay as department chairs. They are released from teaching to do administrative work, such as scheduling, that other colleges assign to deans. City College employs 11 deans. The chairs have their own labor union, work 10 months rather than 12, as deans do, and must have their classes covered by other faculty.

Pending refinements still to be negotiated between the college and the union, the move will send most chairs back to class.

Many of them waited for seven hours on hard, plastic chairs as the trustees conducted other business. They packed into the small auditorium on the main campus at 50 Phelan Ave., remaining steadfastly into the morning hours.

Dozens argued passionately against the plan to replace them with 12 deans and three associate vice chancellors. They said students would suffer if departments lost their knowledgeable faculty leader, only to be replaced by what they portrayed as a paper-pushing bureaucrat overseeing several departments yet lacking expertise in any of them.

"We're ready for radical change - just not reckless change," Kristina Whalen, chair of the speech department, told the trustees to cheers from the faculty.

Major downsizing

Many criticized the board for rushing the proposal without vetting it with faculty.

Greg Keech, chair of the English as a Second Language Department, accused the trustees of union-busting.

"The purpose is to erode faculty control and academic democracy at this college," he said.

But in the end, torn between faculty pleas and the possibility of losing the college, the trustees approved the decision with little discussion. Only Trustee Chris Jackson asked for a review once the new system was in place.

The move was part of the first major downsizing by a board that has been diffident about cutting its budget even as state funding for City College plunged by $25 million since 2008.

Now the trustees have to close a $15 million budget gap expected for the 2013-14 school year, Vice Chancellor Peter Goldstein said, then dropped another bomb: If voters reject Prop. 30, a tax measure on the Nov. 6 ballot, the school's budget will plunge by another $11.4 million.

The Accrediting Commission for Junior and Community Colleges gave the college until mid-March to repair 14 major deficiencies - including its muddled leadership structure. That overhaul was one of several significant decisions made during the marathon meeting.

The trustees also voted unanimously to close the Bernal Heights State Preschool to save $84,000 a year, and to end summer hours at their three other college-run child care centers.

City College spends $700,000 a year on the centers that serve as laboratories for child-development majors and as places where parents can learn alternatives to corporal punishment.

Jackson initially argued that the college "should have compassion and look at alternatives to closure," saying his own mother depended on such care so she could work.

Student Trustee William Walker said his mother did, too. But he and Trustee Steve Ngo reminded Jackson that the college is in dire straits, with the prospect of layoffs and the elimination of classes looming.

"We're in a crisis right now," Walker said.

Ngo added, "No one wants to cut (child care), but we can't operate like that anymore."

The trustees also hired a "special trustee," giving veto power on accreditation-related decisions to Bob Agrella, retired head of the Sonoma County Junior College District. The trustees approved an eight-month contract at $1,000 per work day, roughly $160,000, and a taxpayer-funded car for Agrella.

Lack of enrollment fees

Also on the jam-packed agenda was what to do about a practice that has cost City College $8.5 million over many years: letting students take classes without paying enrollment fees.

College officials revealed last month that the school loses $400,000 a year by not collecting the fees - a figure that could rise to $1 million a year if nothing is done, Goldstein said.

Fisher, the interim chancellor, said that if the college does not try to collect what is owed, the state can withhold 10 percent of its apportionment as a penalty.

The trustees then unanimously agreed to start collecting fees at registration, and to send a warning to all who owe fees that a collection agency will pursue the debt if they don't pay up.

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